I started dating this girl a little over 6 months ago. She was an old friend from middle school and high school. I always liked her but I didn't want to ruin our friendship so I never acted upon my feelings for her.

Recently she and I hooked up after many years of not talking to each other. One thing lead to another and we were in a relationship. Shes not the most attractive girl but she has a great outgoing personality and I had a great time being with her, she made me happy. I was in love for the first time. She of course had been through many relationships that did not work out. Her fiance left her because they fought all the time. Shes very fiesty and sometimes very controlling. She told me she has been with 9 guys in her life

Heres where it gets complicated. Shes a full time student and she still lives at home with her father (parents divorced recently). We spent a lot of time together. She was always at my house (like 6 months straight), she did not get along with her father too well so she would always spend the night at my house. Considering shes a full time student she didnt have income, I did what I could to support her, buying groceries, cooking for her (im a professional cook), taking her out all the time etc etc.

My mother did not agree with our relationship. She did not like how she was always spending the night. Her main problem with her was that her family was torn apart. She kept telling me that this girl's family and her upbringing is going to affect our relationship in the future if we were serious.

Her father is an alcoholic. He barely gets by trying to pay rent for a 3 bedroom apartment so that his son and my ex can have a place to stay. His wife left him because he was financially unstable and she was forced to work two jobs to support the family. She now lives with a friend. Her mother has cheated on her father before ( we used to talk about it back in highschool). My girlfriend absolutely hates her father, she says many condescending things about him and it always worried me.

I just graduated from college. I have much debt, my current entry level job is very low income. My father passed away when I was younger and he left me an inheritance. My mother is the trustee to the commercial property that I inherited. She is in control of my trust and manages my property. She sees to it that I am taken care of financially. She bought a condo so that I would always have a place to live (which im very thankful of).

So one day my mother goes out of her way by looking through my phone records to get my girlfriends number. She calls her and tells her that she wants to speak with her in person (obviously to break us up). I convince her thats not right and she tells me that I should do it myself then. She kept telling me do not let her down and do not disappoint her. I admit I am a mamas boy. I did not want to break up with her but my mother kept pressuring me.

My mom knew I didnt want to break up with her, so she shows up to my house one day and basically tells my girlfriend how could you basically move into my son's house and take advantage of him and basically kicks her out. My mother flips out says she has lost trust in me and changes the locks to my condo.

I had no where to go, little income and a whole lot of debt. I moved into my girlfriends house with her father just so I could get on my feet. My girlfriend was pretty angry about the whole situation. She called me a mamas boy. At this point she made it very clear that we could only be friends even though I slept in the same bed with her. Strangely her myspace stated that she was single and she was chatting online all the time now. So I felt like our relationship was not going anywhere and eventually I would be struggling to get by or homeless.

Eventually I got in touch with my mother and she wanted to know if we were still in a relationship. I told her no and she gave me the keys to get back in my condo. My girlfriend was not happy I was moving out of her house and going back home. She wanted to cut ties with me. I told her I did not want to break up with her. She refused our relationship until I was living on my own where my mother could not harass her and I would be able to make my own decisions. The only way she would get back with me is if I moved out of my condo and find a place on my own so that my mother had no say in who I could and could not date.

Financially, I would have to get two jobs, get rid of my car, and be a very exhausted person. Moving out of her fathers house and splitting the rent was not an option for her because shes a full time student.

We kept in touch the last couple weeks. She tells me she still loves me and is scared to move forward. I am heartbroken. I am stressed out, I have long days at work only to come home to an empty house. I sleep and then I wake up to go to work. I am depressed and lonely (its like torture).

Then yesterday my buddy logs onto myspace and shows me a message she wrote about how she is worried about me etc etc. I snoop around her page only to find messages from some random guy insinuating some real sexual shit about plumbing her pipes etc. I flipped out. She defended herself saying that it was only a joke. Supposedly this guy had a picture of his ass crack showing on his profile so she said her pipes need fixing... calling him a plumber? Does that make any sense? Am I totally misunderstanding her explanation or does she think im that clueless? Can someone slap some sense into me? She started crying when I told her the explanation doesn't make any sense and I can't believe what I just saw on her myspace. She called me a stalker and tried to blame everything on my like im overreacting. Really immature. I called her this morning to work things out she doesnt want to talk to me.

Words cannot explain how I feel right now. Can someone who is not caught up in emotion please tell me wtf is going on? Is she someone I can trust? Im confused.

 

Not trying to be a jerk, but can you please post some cliff notes? I promise you'll get more/better advice.

 

First thing you have to do is try to work something out financially, either with a new job, two jobs, refinancing your loans, getting a cheaper car, etc. Somehow you have to break that financial tie to your mother.

Secondly, you gotta kick your mom to the curb. She's your mom, yes, but her pronouncements about what you should do at most should be taken as advice, not as what you must do. She can be important in your life, but her importance must fade as your relationship advances with a woman.

 

man i would run away from that one. she is a mess and IS TAKING ADVANTAGE OF YOU AND YOUR MONEY!!!! she says she wants you to live on your own etc. so she can mooch(sp?) off of you.. be glad its over and move on to find someone you can have a mutual relationship with. not one that is very one sided... thats just my :twocents:

 

this is very true but a parent wants whats best for their child, seeing her son being used did not sit well with her. I can see her point of view, but she took it to far!!

 

My mom says she did this to protect me financially. She says that she in not the one for me. What if she gets knocked up.

The condo i am living in she pays for but it is under my name because of property taxes. She says the condominium is a gift to me so that I wont struggle and I will be comfortable. I think she is protecting herself as well.

I love this girl and I want to trust her but my emotions are clouding my judgment.

I am lost.

So far you guys have given me great advice. I am working hard and saving every penny I have so that I can be independent and think for myself.

This is my first serious relationship and its taking a toll on me. I feel bad for her and this is a messed up situation all around.

 

you're young man there is PLENTY of the fish in the sea.. and really I wouldn't call it a serious relationship at just 6 months.. thats still a feeling out period.

 

mothers always say they do what's best for their child... but you need to realize it's best in their perspective, and you cannot assume their perspective is always the best ones

move on and get rid of her.. there are much more important things you need to concentrate with your life now than a girl you are describing..


good luck

 

I just heard an interesting saying in a Chris Rock movie of all places: you can lose a lot of money chasing women, but you'll never lose women chasing money. You're a recent graduate with the future in front of you. Please don't get hung up on this one girl. What you're feeling is natural in any relationship that's breaking apart; it doesn't mean she's special.
Focus on YOUR future; you're not established enough to worry about supporting two when you can scarcely take care of yourself without your mom's help.

 

agreed... like you said, you must get back on your feet - truly

then once your financially put back together, use 10$ of your money to buy a copy of "Because I Said So"

 

1) Move on/away from "girlfriend," especially as she has already broken up with you. Everything you described about her indicates she is bad news and not trustworthy.
2) Your mom was right this time, but don't let her take over your life again. You need to make your own mistakes.
G/L!

 

Move on brother, it wasn't meant to be, like others said there's lots of fish in the sea

 

you have your own bachelor pad that is being paid for. no need to work your butt off. ditch the chick and find a decent one that you can bring to mom. family comes first.

 

listen to your mom. the gf has too many issues.

 

Always listen to your mother! Always! Especially about girls, they know that kind of stuff....LMAO...Sounds like a gold digger to me! When you were down and out she was out too..

On a side note!

Your mom changed the locks and kicked you out of your place!

PRICELESS!

 

Thanks guys this is what I wanted to hear, my intuitions were right. Time to move on and there are plenty of fish in the sea

i got owned lol.

 

by your mom
good luck on your next gf

 

On a serious note, atleast she got around to you. Drastic times call 4 drastic measures! Keep your mom out of your business, ie gf's don't tell her about their families and stuff. Her (gf) business is your business, and your business is not your moms business.... I have friends that tell their moms everything and then wonders why their mom hates all their gf's...


Chalk this lesson up to being young and dumb! We've all been there! I'm still there from time to time and I'm going to be 25 in a month

 

Go out and find a rich chick

 

yeah breakups suck, go to a bar and party or play some video games.

 

Sounds like you have a controlling girlfriend and a controlling mother. Makes for a challenging life, and somewhere, you're gonna have to grab your own balls and claim them.

Not to suggest that your mother may be acting inappropriately, but you need to gain access to a copy of the trust documents, and determine, specifically, what your mother's rights are as trustee, what yours are as beneficiary, and so on. At 23, unless you want to be at the whim of your mother's capricious behavior, you need to know. Maybe the trust gives her sweeping authoritarian control over your finances, maybe it does not.......And, I might suggest that a woman who lost her husband at a realtively early time in their life together may just not want to "give up" her son, even if you had fallen in love with a saint. Somewhere she may need to come to grips with the concept that you are not a surrogate replacement for your late father.

Your GF has a complex childhood, as you acknowledge. She needs to get her butt into a chair at ACOA, (Adult Chidren of Alcoholocs) so that she can begin to learn from peers, and begin to create a different reality base. With that history, she may well want/need therapy, whether or not she can "afford it". Frankly, whether you love this woman or not, if she is unwilling to do deep work to challenge the malignant belief structures learned in a childhood filled with emotional neglect and a variety of abuses, your relationship is unlikely to mature .

Given the irrational behavior of both women, you have to be the self-caring one, and you and only you can define and look after your own interests. Your mothe has an agenda, and your gf has an agenda. you need to figure out what your needs are, cleave to them, and let the chips fall where they may. Somewhere, if you have the nerve I think you do, you will carefully, politely, untie momma's apron strings and go your own way. And, your gf has some deep work to do to claim her own adulthood. She might as well start now.

 

what if my mother refuses to give me copies of the trust. Our relationship is not healthy at all and I feel that she has some sort of financial agenda. She has not worked a day since the age of 27 and I don't think she wants to either. She claims how she is supporting me still but she never earned a penny to support me and if she did, i don't think i would be getting any support at all.

What do I do, go see a lawyer?

 

see what i'm trying to show you here? Your property, your inheritance, your trust. your mother is not taking care of you financially, at least not with her own money.

get a lawyer, review your documents and take control of YOUR money YOUR inheritance YOUR property and begin to take care of yourself and support your mother if you wish to do so.

 

What happens when I show up to a lawyers office and I have no documents, nothing. I don't think I can afford a lawyer either.

Also if I am granted the property how will I manage it? Im sure there is some sort of property loan, my income is so low what will happen?

My mother will absolutely hate me if I do this and shes all I have when it comes to family.

 

oh yeah my ex girlfriend doesn't want to burn bridges. She hopes maybe we will cross paths later on She dumped me She said it was a hard decision but she had to

Shes blaming everything on me is that right?

 

just let her think that and move on.

do you know how much is in that trust?

 

Forget the girlfriend forever IMO, she is trash. Who cares if shes blaming anything on you, its not your problem. Set your life straight first.

 

I don't give any relationship details to any of my family and most of friends. I'm a private person, and it's not something they need to know.



And speedstream, it's time to become completely independent from your Mom. I'm not saying end the relationship with her, you just need to quit letting her control you. It's not healthy, especially at 23. Good luck.

 

yes. ABSOLUTELY. Your mom is using her control of a trust to manipulate your life, clearly in part because she is bored and has no clue how to structure her own. Hire a lawyer, first, just on general principles. Moreover, hire a shark. A real pro, one from a prominent and powerful law firm that eats misbehaving trustees of trusts for lunch.

If the trust was part of your father's will, the will needed to be probated, and that may make it a matter of public record.

in many jurisdictions, when a trust is established for the benefit of a minor, the court that endorses the establishment of the trust (which would have been via your dad's will, probably) the trustees need to file an annual report with the court on your behalf. Those records, if they exist, may be accessible to you up till 21. And, for that matter, the will may have an age-dependent clause embedded in it which your mother is reluctant to speak to, such as your becoming an equal trustee at 25, 30, etc.....

There may be other ways, including some less elegant ones, such as bonding sufficiently as to have free rein of her home, then ransacking her papers at night. (I confess to having had a similarly unfortuante relationship with my parents; when they told me they were broke and could no longer afford my college expenses, I ransacked my father's desk at night and discoverd that the two of them, between them, had, for the time, a staggering joint income. Their problem was that they were pissing it away at the liquer store. With facts in hand, I was able to apprpoach them on clear ground. They paid for four years, I paid for my remaining three degrees; I note that my college expenses totaled less than 5% of their annual income at the time. Was my behaviour rude? Yep. Do I regret it? Absolutely not..... when parents lie, scam or misrepresent, they deserve to be called on it.........irtonically, when my mother's health failed, I became her guardian. I was far more ethical in my treatment of her than she of me.......)

Did your father have a business associate or attorney who was a friend/colleague that you can speak freely with (have to be careful with that one).

If your mother is, in any way, mismanaging the trust, or not managing it to your benefit as the primary benificiary, you could, in many jurisdictions, go to the courts and have her replaced. If you discover that she is charging bizarre "management fees" to to "manage" the trust, I would be suspicious. If you discover that significant portions of the trust have 'melted away', I would be suspicious.

It is too difficult to give really cogent advice given the nature of what is unfolding, but if you don't trust your mother;'s motives, you probably have some well-founded reasons. Explore, quietly, and on your own terms, what your real financial circumstance is, what her real power and authority is, and call her on it.

 

What documents would i need to look for to find out about my trust. I would really like to know if she is mismanaging my trust. There is a reason I am clueless about this and it does not settle well with me.

Damn it hurts to know the 2 women in my life have agendas. My ex kept asking me about my inheritance and she would push me to go to a lawyer to gain financial independence from my mother. My ex wanted someone to take care of her, support her, someone to get married to, have children etc... Now that I think about it the similarities of these two women are scary.

I am so down and out.

 

on a side not when my mother realized we were having a sexual relationship she immediately called an estate planner/lawyer and now we have an appointment in sept.

Maybe I will be able to find out the details in this meeting?

 

Breathe deep, the frustration that you are feeling is that of the onslaught of maturity.

it is not surprising that your gf might bear a passing similarity to your mom in certain wildly codependent ways. Her behavior patterns feel familiar........ instead of berating yourself, consider yourself lucky that you figured out what you were doing at the age of 23.

I would wait, with some interest, for the meeting with the estate planner and attorney in September. Recognizing that he is hired by your mom, you still may be able to learn a great deal from him. If he is anything more than a pure shill for your mom, you may be able to create a rational platform for a true fiscal discussion with your mom, which would be a good thing.

In the meantime, I would still snoop around to find a decent law firm, one with a formidable and impeccable reputation. They will be $$$, but will be worth it if your circumstance with your mother turns adversarial at any time. (I never begrudge these guys their $$$ if they know their stuff).

I assume that your father left a will. That will must be probated, which means that its information is a matter of public record, save in some bizarre circumstances. Moreover, you are an of-age son of your late father, and have some entitlements. That will probably structured the trust. So, it is the probated will/trust document that you seek. Again, a decent attorney can snoop that out for you, possibly before your meeting with your mom's attorney/estate planner.

Parents who use money to manage their kids are despicable, Speedstream, and it is a power/authority play, generally by folks so pathetic they cannot command the attention of their children any other way. And, for that matter, girlfriends who seek to "support:" their boyfriend in securing a full understanding of their fiscal independence and wherewithall may be either very altruistic or very motivated by the tall green........

I would seek to find the terms of your father's trust for YOUR benefit, for YOUR sense of comfort. I would then take a long, hard look at both the relatinships with your mom and your girlfriend, and abandon the concept that emotonal abuse and manipulative behavior is acceptable simply because of its source. Your mother's behavior is reprehensible, adn your gf's only slightly less so, mostly because she is younger..... and, as I noted earlier, your gf is likely to become a rich and resonant lifemate only when she begins to tackle her own stuff. I am sorry that she comes from a home with a destructive and irresponsible father, but as a young adult, she needs to assume responsiblity for healing herself.

 

Thank you Ric. I cannot express how much I appreciate your advice. You are a great individual and I hope to be wise like you one day.

Emotionally I am shattered. I wish I never inherited a dime. I wish my father was still around. He was my hero.

 

Thanks; some of my wisdom is actually just pure life experience, having come from a family that had some parallel complexities, to say the least. It became imparative for me to build an independent platform from them in my late teens/early twenties, becuase they were toxic folks. That can be hard to grapple with when other folks have wonderful families to go home to and to celebrate, not challenge, life events, but it sounds as if you are actually, whether your mother wishes to accept it or not, an orphan.

That feeling of being shattered may simply be the realistic shucking away of the self-protective blinders you have had for so many years, necessary when you were truly dependent upon her. I would truly urge upon you the process of assuming adult resposibilities for your own actions, and REQUIRE that of others. Your mother and gf are both inmature folks, unwilling to acknowledge their own actions for what they are. Both pose different challenges, but both require that you be absolutely clear about your own needs and wishes in life. Mind you, neiter will like this "new you"; they both would prefer a more naieve and pliant youth that will respond to their percetions of their needs. That's not what it's about.....

Think about what your father really meant by leaving a trust to your benefit. Think about honoring his wishes in the way you live. He may not be present in your daily life, but he can be present in your values structure. I strongly suspect that your father left money in a trust to keep is wife from spending it down, frankly. Now, it is time, as an adult, to find out what that trust really is, what it realy contains, and what role you can really sustain in undestanding it, managing it, and truly structuring your own benefit from it. And, I strongly doubt that your dad structured that trust for the benefit of his wife or any future girlfriend of yours. He planned it for you.

 

"ric" you are a wise man. I'm speechless. What a great choice of words. I learned a lot myself.

Goodluck Speedstream.

 

Thanks. I think that, perhaps, I am more experienced than wise. In addition, I have grappeled with a wildly dysfunctional family of origin, and have learned to call bs for what it is. Part of the "Great American Dream" is that we all come from wonderful loving families. Some do, actually, but some do not; Speedstream's falls in the latter category, now.

Speedstream lost a dad at a vulnerable age and has a mom who has not, it appears, really learned to cope, and has strived to keep her son emotionally and fiscally dependent on her in an effort to fill a profoundly empty void in her life. Sad, very sad, but no reason for Speedstream to buy into Mom's needs as the driver for his own ship, certainly not at the age of 23, when he is young, choices are vast, and hope is strong....

Adult Children of Alchoholics has a wonderful slogan "detatch with love", meaning that one can sustain loving feelings with dysfunctinoal family members while objectively structuring interatcitons with them that are mature and realistic. Frankly, I think Speedstream has an uphill battle with mom, who may NEVER buy into his being an adult - to put it another way, sometimes Mom's apron strings can be untied, sometimes they need to be cut. And, Speedstream needs to do so whilst maintaining his rightful access to a trust that his father set up for HIM... not his mom, not the man in the moon, but HIM. There is an issue of true entitlement that the creation of that trust represents.

 

Move on as said.

And you need to cut the mama boy strings. Only YOU can do it.
You don't need anything to talk to a lawyer. No papers, no proof, nothing. If a lawyer does help you they only need basic info & get copies of everything they need.

 

I am so confused as to how I break this unhealthy relationship without causing conflict and stress for my mother.

My ex girlfriend told me a while back that in order to want a true relationship with my mother I have to take back whats mine so she has no ties to me financially no agenda. She was right. The ex tried to help me get off my feet and let me stay at her house and I left only to go back to an unhealthy relationship with my mother.

Now I have come to realize that I have hurt the ex almost as much as my mom hurt her. I feel horrible. I regret not sticking up for her (protecting her from my mom), and I regret ever leaving her. We talked last night and I thanked her for everything and I apologized for what I put her through. I miss her to death and I realized that I love her and I truly care about her. She is willing to be there for me, but as far as a relationship goes she said she needs time and space as we are both unstable and need to work out loose ends. She was hurt by what my mom did to her and how I went back to this unhealthy relationship. This devastates me. I need her love now more than ever. I lost one of the only people who truly cared about me.

Please give me advice. I'm so depressed, its taking a toll on me.

 

Two very important women in my life I have lost. My mother basically orphaned me, and my ex g/f left me because I failed to realize what she was doing to both of us. I need to resolve this problem of trust. I admit I have trust issues with my mother and my ex g/f.

 

This is where I feel obligated to jump in and say a few words.

What I'm going to tell you is based on nothing but true life experiences that are actually still on-going...

You are choosing the wrong battle to fight. You DO NOT need to stick up for anyone but YOU. Your ex-girlfriend is not the victim here by any means. She's a part of the drama herself and as much as you might love her, she's should not be your focus.

You are basically moving from being emotionally and financially dependent on your mom, to emotionally depending on your girlfriend and financially having an unforeseen future. That's just wrong.

Your self-esteem and confidence is already on a steep downhill and by using your love for this girl as an excuse for your misery you're only hurting your future.

You DO NOT need this girl in your life. In fact, you don't need ANYONE at this point in your life. This is all about YOU and only YOU. It sounds selfish and kind'a unreal, but it's true. You should eliminate as many variables as possible when it comes to becoming an independent person. Your mom, the trust, the girl, the job and emotions are all variables that will hurt your progress. Get rid of them. Rely only on YOU.

Do not ask for sympathy from anyone. You don't need it.

This girl will come back to you and stick with you if she figures that you don't need her or anyone else to live a happy life. She will beg for you to be with her. That's when you will feel like a winner and you can apply your emotions/love to something worthy.

Stop taking sides. Stop being emotional for a while. Stop appologizing. Be a selfish but respectful MAN. Do not talk much. Take action and stop whining. Be a lion not a singing bird.


I will read this post and try to take my own advise. I stopped looking for answers in other people's words a long time ago. You'll get there too.